Sensing that a person with medical knowledge would be useful for this one, I had a quick chat with Fiona (smiley) about it last evening.

She made the same point as dr.bob about the topological matter - while the empty space inside the organ is topologically outside the body, the organ itself is not. So we can't say that the intestines and lungs are outside the body, but we can say that they are on the outside of the body.

Which causes a bit of an issue with the question as now phrased. We seem to be in general agreement that the skin is the largest organ of all, but it's not an internal organ. Only problem is that on our topological basis, neither is the small intestine or the lung, while the liver is. (Fiona agrees with the suggestion of 1500 cm³ as a typical liver volume, and with 6000 cm³ as typical of two healthy lungs - but that last includes air space, as does egg's value for the small intestine.)

Hmmm, we seem to be able to justify skin, small intestine, and liver as possible answers to the question. Damn. One thing which is undeniable; the liver is the largest gland in the human body. (Rude drinking songs notwithstanding, the male member is not a gland.)

I've encountered breasts that are larger than the average liver, certainly. But in fact, the mammary gland is only part of the breast, and is reasonably constant in size from woman to woman in the same condition. (The mammary glands become enlarged when a woman is pregnant or lactating, and there is also a slight change in size over the menstrual cycle.)

But in the normal way, the greater part of the volume of the breast is adipose tissue (i.e. fat), which doesn't count as part of the mammary gland.

Pedantic I know, but I think that the other caveat here is that the question should be phrased about a normal, healthy human. There are various medical conditions where particular organs can become enlarged (e.g. elephantiasis of the testes).

THE minister charged with overhauling the NHS is testing a new form of scar-free surgery in which diseased organs are pulled out through the patient’s throat.

Professor Lord Darzi, chair of surgery at Imperial College London, has conducted preliminary experiments with the technique in which robotically controlled instruments are lowered into the patient’s stomach.

A hole is made in the lining of the stomach, then the organ - usually an appendix or gall bladder - is cut out and pulled up through the throat before the hole is stitched, leaving the patient with no external scars and a reduced risk of infection because the wounds are not exposed to the air.

The technique, called natural orifice translumenal endoscopic surgery, has been successfully used on patients in America, France and India. Darzi, who became a health minister last year, is one of the first surgeons in Britain to use the technique in experiments on pigs, before the first human tests.

While admitting it was still “early days”, Darzi believes the probe could eventually be used to remove cancers.

The main after-effects include a sore throat and an unpleasant taste in the mouth from having a diseased organ pulled through it.

Other orifices could be used but Darzi said he believed the mouth was the most promising. He said some aspects of the procedure needed perfecting.

“If we are going to enter through the stomach we need to develop the appropriate tools to make sure we can close the hole properly,” he said.

Darzi’s team are developing a new surgical robot called the iSnake, which they hope will assist in the new procedure and in keyhole surgery.

Other research projects on the new procedure are under way at hospitals around Britain. The first operations on patients in Britain are expected in three to four years.

Here's another one which you all can probably help with. Which is the strongest muscle in the body?

From wik:

Quote:

In ordinary parlance, muscular "strength" usually refers to the ability to exert a force on an external object—for example, lifting a weight. By this definition, the masseter or jaw muscle is the strongest.

If "strength" refers to the force exerted by the muscle itself, e.g., on the place where it inserts into a bone, then the strongest muscles are those with the largest cross-sectional area. By this definition, the strongest muscle of the body is usually said to be the quadriceps femoris or the gluteus maximus.

A shorter muscle will be stronger "pound for pound" (i.e., by weight) than a longer muscle. The myometrial layer of the uterus may be the strongest muscle by weight in the human body. At the time when an infant is delivered, the entire human uterus weighs about 1.1 kg (40 oz). During childbirth, the uterus exerts 100 to 400 N (25 to 100 lbf) of downward force with each contraction.

Purely for the good of the show, I'd like the answer to be the uterus or the backside, but what do people think?

A shorter muscle will be stronger "pound for pound" (i.e., by weight) than a longer muscle. The myometrial layer of the uterus may be the strongest muscle by weight in the human body. At the time when an infant is delivered, the entire human uterus weighs about 1.1 kg (40 oz). During childbirth, the uterus exerts 100 to 400 N (25 to 100 lbf) of downward force with each contraction.

So in theory babies less than 40kg can be fired up and across the room like a cannonball.

Surely the only sensible way to measure how big an organ is the mass, so that we aren't including all the process stuff inside. I know that's not technically size but it's the only thing that works.

I think the small intestine will be jolly thin and therefore jolly light once the partially digested food is taken out, but I've failed to prove it too.